Historical Monuments of Mtskheta
The Historical Monuments of Mtskheta are located in the cultural landscape at the confluence of the Aragvi and Mtkvari Rivers, in Central-Eastern Georgia, some 20km northwest of Tbilisi in Mtskheta. The property consists of the Jvari Monastery, the Svetitstkhoveli Cathedral and the Samtavro Monastery.
Mtskheta was the ancient capital of Kartli, the East Georgian Kingdom from the 3rd century BC to the 5th century AD, and was also the location where Christianity was proclaimed as the official religion of Georgia in 337. To date, it still remains the headquarters of the Georgian Orthodox and Apostolic Church.
The favourable natural conditions, its strategic location at the intersection of trade routes, and its close relations with the Roman Empire, the Persian Empire, Syria, Palestine, and Byzantium, generated and stimulated the development of Mtskheta and led to the integration of different cultural influences with local cultural traditions. After the 6th century AD, when the capital was transferred to Tbilisi, Mtskheta continued to retain its leading role as one of the important cultural and spiritual centres of the country.
Historical Monuments of Mtskheta
The historic churches of Mtskheta, former capital of Georgia, are outstanding examples of medieval religious architecture in the Caucasus. They show the high artistic and cultural level attained by this ancient kingdom.
Description is available under license CC-BY-SA IGO 3.0
Colchic Rainforests and Wetlands
Colchic Rainforests and Wetlands
The property comprises seven component parts, within an 80km long corridor along the warm-temperate and extremely humid eastern coast of the Black Sea. They provide a series of the most typical Colchic ecosystems at altitudes ranging from sea level to more than 2,500 metres above it.
The main ecosystems are ancient deciduous Colchic rainforests and wetlands, percolation bogs and other mire types of the distinct Colchic mire region. The extremely humid broad-leaved rainforests comprise a highly diverse flora and fauna, with very high densities of endemic and relict species, with significant numbers of globally threatened species and relict species, which survived the glacial cycles of the Tertiary.
The site is home to approximately 1,100 species of vascular and non-vascular plants, including 44 threatened vascular plan species, and almost 500 species of vertebrates, and a high number of invertebrate species. The site also harbours 19 threatened animal species including sturgeon, notably the critically endangered Colchic Sturgeon. It is a key stopover for many globally threatened birds that migrate through the Batumi bottleneck.
Description is available under license CC-BY-SA IGO 3.0
The property is situated in Georgia, within the Autonomous Republic of Adjara as well as the regions of Guria and Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti. It comprises a series of seven component parts, which are located close to each other within an 80 km long corridor along the warm-temperate and extremely humid eastern coast of the Black Sea.
They provide an almost complete altitudinal series of the most typical Colchic ecosystems running from sea level to more than 2,500 m above sea level. The main ecosystems are ancient deciduous Colchic rainforests and wetlands – particularly percolation bogs and other mire types of the Colchic mire region, a distinct mire region within Europe and Eurasia.
The Colchic Rainforests and Wetlands are relict forests, which have survived the glacial cycles of the ice age. The extremely humid nemoral broad-leaved rainforests comprise a highly diverse flora and fauna, with very high densities of endemic and relict species. This is the result of millions of years of uninterrupted evolution and speciation processes within the Colchic Pliocene refugium.
The peatlands of the Colchis mire region, which are closely interlinked with lowland Colchic rainforests, also reflect the mild and extremely humid conditions there. These allow for the existence of percolation bogs, the simplest functional type of mires, only occurring in the Colchis mire region. In addition to percolation bogs, there is a complete series of other succession stages of mire development in the Colchic wetland s.
